Tony Zerilli was in prison when Hoffa disappeared from a Detroit-area restaurant in 1975, but tells New York TV station WNBC he was informed about Hoffa’s whereabouts after his release. The ailing 85-year-old took a reporter to a field near Rochester, north of Detroit, but no exact location was disclosed. The report was also aired on Detroit’s WDIV.

“The master plan was … they were going to put him in a shallow grave here,” Zerilli said ( http://bit.ly/W1KgZp). “Then, they were going to take him from here to Rogers City upstate. There was a hunting lodge and they were going to bury in a shallow grave, then take him up there for final burial. Then, I understand, that it just fell through.”

Zerilli did not say during the aired interview why he chose to make his claims now. WNBC reported he is promoting an upcoming book titled “Hoffa Found,” the website for which promises to reveal details about Hoffa’s death.

No listed phone number for Zerilli could be found Monday by The Associated Press.

The FBI declined to comment when asked if Zerilli’s claims were credible. Former Detroit FBI head Andrew Arena said the remarks deserve serious consideration.

“Anthony Zerilli was reputed to be the underboss of the Detroit organized crime family, so he would have been in the know,” Arena said.

Zerilli’s criminal record includes a 2002 conviction for conspiracy and extortion. He was sentenced to six years in prison.

Hoffa, Teamsters president from 1957-71, was an acquaintance of mobsters and adversary to federal officials. The day he disappeared, he was supposed to meet with a New Jersey Teamsters boss and a Detroit Mafia captain.

In September, police took soil from a suburban backyard after a tip Hoffa had been buried there. It was just one of many fruitless searches. Previous tips led police to a horse farm northwest of Detroit in 2006, a Detroit home in 2004 and a backyard pool two hours north of the city in 2003.

As you comment, please be respectful of other commenters and other viewpoints. Our goal with article comments is to provide a space for civil, informative and constructive conversations. We reserve the right to remove any comment we deem to be defamatory, rude, insulting to others, hateful, off-topic or reckless to the community. See our full terms of use here.

More in News

In Mears Park, the holiday luminescence has lost some luster. The twinkle has tapered. The shine has dimmed. On a chilly Monday evening, Jacob Moore and his rat terrier, Tucker, wandered through downtown St. Paul’s Lowertown neighborhood, where they were underwhelmed by the holiday light display. The bars were busy, but the trees inside Mears Park were bare, though lights...

The River City Sculpture Tour, which this year brought a moose, giant dragonfly and chokecherry tree to downtown Stillwater, has been such a success that the organizer is planning to make it bigger and better in 2017. Artist and tour founder Julie Pangallo said Tuesday that she plans to expand the to downtown Bayport. “The tour has been phenomenally well-received,” Pangallo...

A 60-year-old Faribault man was killed Thursday evening when his car collided with a semitrailer in Rice County. The Minnesota State Patrol reported that Randy J. Hansen was driving a 1995 Pontiac Grand Am southbound on Highway 21 and making a left turn to continue eastbound on 21 shortly after 5:30 p.m. when his car collided with a semi going...

Transit for Liveable Communities and St. Paul Smart Trips are merging Jan. 1 to create a new nonprofit organization to promote buses, trains, bikes, car sharing, walking and other alternatives to putting more cars on the road.

DULUTH, Minn. — A Roanoke, Va., multimillionaire who made his fortune in health care and has recently purchased coal mines wants to buy the bankrupt Magnetation LLC operations on Minnesota’s Iron Range and put laid-off employees back to work. That’s the plan of Tom Clarke, owner of ERP Compliant Fuels and now ERP Iron Ore, who has brokered a deal...

Renaldo Terez McDaniel was looking under the hood of his car outside a St. Paul auto-parts store on a summer evening last June when three shots were fired. One hit the 31-year-old McDaniel in the shoulder, another pierced his stomach. The third struck his head.